Where It Went Wrong
by RilienRhovanion
Summary: Maslow's hierarchy of needs and where and how it failed, if applied to Frodo and Sam on their quest. A bit like an essay... Most people will probably find it boring, but if this sort of thing interests you, give it a try. Or just read it anyway.


The following was inspired by reading George Orwell's _1984_ in English class. I decided to apply the concept of Maslow's hierarchy to Frodo and Sam to prove it incorrect.

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Maslow's hierarchy of needs suggests that all human behavior is based on fulfillment of certain needs. If a human is trying to deal with a lower need, s/he cannot move to the next level. The hierarchy is as follows:

COLD AND HUNGER—This is the lowest level. If a human cannot satisfy this problem, s/he is unable to cope enough to move to the next level.

SAFETY AND FREEDOM FROM HARM—At this level, a human spends his/her time trying to keep safe, which denies that human the chance to operate at the next level.

LOVE AND FRIENDSHIP—Once the lower needs are satisfied, the human then operates at this level. This need must be satisfied in order to move on to the next level.

COMMUNITY AND BELONGING-- The fourth level.

SELF-ACTUALIZATION—The last level.

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Although Maslow's hierarchy was meant for humans, if it applied to hobbits, it went very wrong for our two favorite Shire-folk. Frodo and Sam had love and friendship, community and belonging, and self-actualization on the quest to Mordor, but their lower needs, cold and hunger, and safety and freedom from harm went mostly unfulfilled. According to Maslow, they should not have been able to achieve their goal without their basic needs satisfied.

The first level, satisfaction from cold and hunger, was obviously unfulfilled by Frodo and Sam. Hobbits eat much more than other races of Middle-Earth, and although they had _lembas _from Lothlorien on their journey to Mount Doom, it was not enough to satisfy the immense appetite of hobbits. One page 210 of _The Two Towers_, Sam says that he never thought he would "wish for a change" in food, but now he craves "a bit of plain bread, and a mug… of beer." He mentions that they have "naught to make a fire with, for a start, and naught to cook, not even grass!"

Again, the fact that they lack food is revealed when on page 229 of the aforementioned book, Frodo says: "We have very little to share," when he offers food to Gollum. On page 261, Gollum supplies Sam with "two small rabbits" and Sam makes a stew, though he says "there's nought to go with them but a few herbs" (263). The meager stew and "half a piece of the elvish waybread each,' seems like "a feast" to the hobbits who have been deprived of food for so long (263). In Osgiliath, they have a chance for an evening meal that "seemed a feast" (285). "Neither Frodo nor Sam refused anything that was offered, nor a second, nor indeed a third helping" (285). The fact that their voracious hobbit appetites were unsatisfied for the greater part of the journey should have occupied Frodo and Sam with finding food, and nothing else. As we all know, that is not the case.

The two hobbits were also constantly in the cold. Tolkien never mentioned either of them sleeping indoors for a prolonged period of time after the breaking of the fellowship. On page 210 of _The Two Towers_, he wrote "They slept as well as they could for the cold, turn and turn about, in a nook among great jagged pinnacles of weathered rock; at least hey were sheltered from the easterly wind." This implies that although they were out of the wind, they were still cold, and the cold prevented them from sleeping as well as they might have. The weather is described on page 233 as "cold clammy winter."

Frodo and Sam lacked proper food and warmth, proving the first level to be unfulfilled. According to Maslow, it should have been impossible for them to move on to any of the higher levels without first dealing with their hunger and the inhospitable weather.

I hardly need to scour my copy of Lord of the Rings for examples to show how Frodo and Sam did not fulfill the second level, safety and freedom from harm. There were obviously many dangers on the way to Mordor: orcs, Shelob, the eye of Sauron, Nazgul… The list goes on. There is no way that this level could have been fulfilled. If Frodo and Sam were safe the whole time they traveled to destroy the ring, their quest really wouldn't be much of a story. They were not safe; second level unfulfilled. This makes sense, considering they never came close to fulfilling the first level.

Things begin to go wrong when we come to the last three levels, love and friendship, community and belonging, and self-actualization. Frodo and Sam fulfilled these levels, although, according to Maslow's hierarchy, they shouldn't have been able to.

Love and friendship. Fulfilled. Frodo and Sam survived because of their love and friendship. Sam's devotion to Frodo ensured that the quest was successful. Sam was the one who organized food, and the one who stood watch to make sure Frodo was as safe as was possible in the conditions of Mordor. They are on the quest together because they are friends. They wouldn't travel on a mission to save Middle-Earth if they didn't get along; they never would have made it.

Both Sam and Frodo fulfilled the last two levels. They knew their strengths and weaknesses. They knew what they had to do. They had a community. They had friends. The fellowship, the hobbits in the Shire, the elves, and the rangers of Ithilien were their friends; their community. Actually, if you think about it, all of Middle-Earth was their community. They went on the quest to save the people of Middle-Earth from being overtaken by Sauron. If they didn't care about others, if they were too absorbed in worrying about their cold and hunger and their safety, they would have abandoned the quest. But they didn't. This proves Maslow's hierarchy to be flawed. Maslow perhaps did not take into account the people's virtues, like nobility and self-sacrifice, demonstrated by Frodo and Sam. The two hobbits failed in the first two levels, but fulfilled the last three, only because they have feelings; they are willing to sacrifice personal comfort to save others. They proved that people do not need to be warm and well-fed and safe to form friendships and be part of a community and discover the meaning of life. All it takes is two hobbits from a much-loved story to prove a seemingly brilliant idea very wrong.


End file.
